Former first minister Humza Yousaf has accused Elon Musk of seeking to “inflame racial tensions” with a reference to the infamous murder of Kriss Donald in 2004.
The Glasgow schoolboy, aged 15 at the time, was abducted and killed in a racist attack by an Asian gang led by Imran Shahid on March 15 2004.
Posting on his social media platform X, the world’s richest man quoted a post from an activist which discussed the murder, saying “first time I’ve heard of this”.
The billionaire owner of Tesla and SpaceX, who has a key role in the incoming Trump administration, has made a number of remarks on UK politics in recent days.
This has included attacking the Prime Minister as “two tier Keir” who delivers “no justice for severe, violent crimes, but prison for social media posts”.
Mr Musk has clashed with Mr Yousaf online previously, attacking the Hate Crime Act which the SNP politician introduced.
In response to Mr Musk’s post on Tuesday, the former first minister highlighted the role of the UK’s first Muslim MP Mohammad Sarwar in bringing Kriss’s killers to justice.
Mr Sarwar, who is the father of current Scottish labour leader Anas Sarwar, travelled to Pakistan to ensure the killers were extradited to the UK after they fled there.
Mr Yousaf spoke about the case further on LBC’s Tonight With Andrew Marr show.
Mr Yousaf said: “Typical of Elon Musk to suddenly amplify that case because he, of course, is only interested in highlighting cases that involve, it tends to be migrants, people of colour, or indeed Muslims.
“The Kriss Donald murder was a dreadful murder where a young, innocent white male inside Glasgow, in the Pollokshields area, was kidnapped, tortured, killed, murdered in one of the most brutal ways by a gang of Scottish Asian youth.”
He continued: “And (the killers) almost evaded justice. If it wasn’t, in fairness, for the efforts of Mohammad Sawar MP, the first Muslim MP ever to be elected to the House of Commons, who went over to Pakistan, rattled a lot of cages to his credit, and managed to bring the perpetrators back to Scotland to face the full force of the law.
“And I should say on the Kriss Donald murder, it was in fact Kriss Donald’s mother Angela, who made a plea at the time that her son’s murder not be used to inflame racial tensions. That is exactly what Elon Musk is trying to do.”
Elon Musk needs to be stopped.
After he fanned the flames of racial division in the UK last summer, I warned that he was one of the most dangerous men on the planet.
Armed with billions and driven by hatred, it is time we confront Musk’s hateful rhetoric, not pander to it. pic.twitter.com/7WhovmjcwQ
— Humza Yousaf (@HumzaYousaf) January 9, 2025
In a concurrent video post on X, uploaded at 5.54pm, the former first minister reiterated his claim made last year that Mr Musk remains “one of the most dangerous men on the planet”.
He said: “Elon Musk needs to be stopped. This isn’t just about one tweet or one individual, it’s about a pattern we’ve seen globally.
“Powerful individuals with massive platforms are amplifying harmful rhetoric, they’re normalising prejudice, and all to create division through the spread of disinformation.
“Last summer, after he fanned the flames of racial intolerance here in the UK, I warned that Elon Musk was one of the most dangerous men on the planet.
“Everything, everything that he has done since then has only reinforced that view. Not only has he used his vast billions to muscle his way into the White House, he’s not attempting to subvert democracy by trying to overthrow the democratically elected Prime Minister of the UK.”
He said the tech guru espouses views that are sympathetic to the far-right, and is driven by “anti-Muslim hatred”, which he says “seems to be the driving force for the world’s wealthiest man.”
He lambasted Mr Musk’s support for far-right figures such as Tommy Robinson and far-right Dutch politician Geert Wilders, who has compared the Koran to Adolf Hitler’s autobiographical manifesto, Mein Kampf.
He also criticised the billionaire’s support for Alternative fur Deutschland (AFD) [Alternative for Germany], a far-right populist party which has a chapter in its manifesto titled: Islam does not belong to Germany. Its expansion and the ever-increasing number of Muslims in the country are viewed by the AFD as a danger to our state, our society, and our values.
Mr Yousaf said: “Ignoring Musk and the far-right is not an option. We need to take them on and we must confront the divisive rhetoric.”
As well as being Labour MP for Glasgow Central until 2010, Mohammed Sarwar later served twice as the governor of Punjab province in Pakistan.
The Tesla owner branded Mr Yousaf “super racist” during one of their online arguments last year, daring the former first minister to sue him.
